Phil Starr

I guess, looking up needled felt leads me to think that there is a huge range of materials here with quite a range of densities and compression so it must be a mechanically variable material. That's a posh way of saying I'm not sure If yours is a dense material you could save some weight by only putting it on three surfaces opposite each other, the back, one side and either top or bottom. If you were with happy minimal damping then just putting something on the back would be most effective.

Do you know I can't remember what I put inside, it's a cab I built live at the SW bass bash last year and 'finished' off with a coat of Tuff Cab when I got home. It still lacks a grille. I'll have a look inside when I get time. I've a particular set of views on waddding which is itself a complex and controversial issue in the design of hi-fi cabs. Go and read Colloms: High Performance Loudspeakers if you want to come out more confused than you went in. I generally favour using a fairly dense wadding stuck to the panels which reduces internal reflections within the cab and can also damp panel resonances. I'm thinking thick carpet felt or mineral loaded plastic foams here. the problem is extra weight which you don't want in a portable cab. I also use the white polyester stuffing you see in commecial cabs and which I rescue/repurpose from old pillows and duvets; such a skinflint I tend to staple this in to break up standing waves inside the cab so it fixed in the middle of the cab not hard against the panels. You need to make sure it doesn't end up covering the end of the vents in a ported cab though. If I have time I tend to use an iterative process of trial and error. If I hear a resonance or see it on a frequency response I'll see if I can kill it with wadding and i'll liten to the cab with and without wadding to see which I prefer. I have to confess to not having done this with this cab. Sorry 🫣

Just one with a tweeter which was the BassChat lockdown 110 that @stevie designed. I did disconnect the tweeter for that one.

Here you go

Ha ha, matching subs to tops is way trickier than it has a right to be. You're lucky to have @Silvia Bluejay out front to balance it all up. I've messed up totally in the past by having the subs too loud, nobody ever starts with them too quiet. Trying to eq for an incorrectly set sub from the desk isn't easy either. I quite enjoyed that, the bv's were coming over nicely. The bass was maybe a bit indistinct at the beginning but I've heard a lot worse and I know how often Shelagh tells me we sounded a lot better in the room than on my own point and shoot recordings. The sub is really discreet I'd have struggled to find it if I hadn't known what I was looking for. Thanks for sharing the video.

The thing is that bass cabs aren't necessarily flat response and Markbass have their own 'sound' with a boomy ill defined low mid peak. Then you have to consider what the tops are doing, They've been designed for a flat response but they have a crossover of their own linking the bass driver to the horn. Push the HPF high enough in the subs crossover and it starts to interact with the crossover in the tops where the bass driver is now acting as the midrange driver in a three way system. Three way crossovers are a total PItA to design well. Keeping the crossover down around the 100Hz range means you are doing all this at a point where our ears aren't too picky/discriminating. IME 120Hz might be the sort of starting point that I'd try. This is a bodge and @synthaside is just going to have to use their ears to get the best out of it. Only they can judge if it is better than the Yamahas on their own but just trying is a great way to learn .

Well a lot can happen in a week. John @Chienmortbb has been looking for a small lightweight sub for some time. He has the usual problems with hefting around huge speakers and one of the solutions are Wharfedale Titans, 12" speakers which have a great vocal sound with a decent horn and driver, go really loud and are nice and light. The problem is the lightweight cab means they don't do bass well at high volumes. That Citronic sub looked like a solution and the thought was that if it wasn't up to the job we'd just remove the plate amp and build a new cab with a better speaker in. £200 for an amp and crossover looked too good to be true. John ordered one too and we unpacked it at the SW Bass Bash on Sunday. So first impressions, it's tiny and very portable, quite nicely made too. The cab seems solid with a decent paint finish, the grill is good enough and some nice handles have been fitted. The plate amp itself seems well constructed and it all works OK. The sound was acceptable, these things don't go down really low but they do add a nice thump to the sound. We were in a smallish room with other people doing other things so we didn't have the cahnce to run at gig volumes but with sub and both 12" tops turned up there was too much bass. turning the sub back to 1.00 o'clock gave a disco bass sound and 12.30 was where the balance was. The sub wasn't flat out distorting before I turned it down and I reckon it was rolled back slightly more than 12db. One of these with a couple of eights might be a good match but two with the Wharfedales would proibably work well. They are light enough for me at 73 to carry two at a time and would back easily into most cars, they are the size of many 1x10 bass cabs. At £200 they are a steal. Looking forward to seeing how @Happy Jack got on at the gig

Is yours the one with the tweeter? I'll have the original Mk1

Just packed the car ready for an early start. I'm only bringing nine speakers this year.

I'm probably going to hell, can I redeem them there? See you tomorrow Mike

That's do-able The RCF Evox is £777 a side and as @Woodinblack says you can pick them up used fairly easily. It might be worth looking at Turbosound if you can get to hear them. Turbosound are 'posh' Behringer an older speaker company bought up by Music Tribe who produce a lot of their designs but made in the Behringer factory. Bugera for PA sort of thing. Their point source speakers are good value but I've not listened to any of their columns. I'm also in the camp of those who recommend you just go for smaller tops. I also use RCF ART 310's for my duo and small gigs and for £300 a side from Thomann they'll probably be a lot better quality than your Behringers, You might even be able to go down to 8" tops

Hi Paddy, do you have a budget in mind for this? There is no point in recommending an FBT Vertus VT1000 system if your budget is limited. It would also be useful to know what you want to put through your PA. If it is vocals only then you'dgo foravery different system to one where the full band are using the PA with no back line. You'll do well to steer clear of the Bose systems, they are heavily over hyped and poor value for money over here in the UK. Generally the issue with these small line source or 'stick' systems is their relative lack of output and higher cost compared to conventional speakers on a pole. They do look great and can speed up set up as well as sound good but it may be worth thinking of just using smaller conventional speakers if your budget is limited. @Woodinblack uses an RCF Evox system which I've heard and sounds good and I've played through a similarly priced LD Maui 28 system which was also quite effective. I notice also that FBT have a new offering the CS 1000 but you are looking at £2500 for a pair of these.

it's now very obvious why your cabs were 'farting out'. You probably know all this but just in case: Out of phase means one speaker cone is moving forwards as the other goes back and the resulting sound waves cancel each other at low frequencies and the bass would be dramatically reduced. You probably went on cranking the amp to compensate hence the strange noises. I'm assuming you've tried them since wired correctly? If so I imagine they were much louder and very much bassier and you had the amp turned down a fair amount so no farting? I don't think your cabs are too big to function well and neither do Eminence. One of their designs is slightly bigger than your cab though they do de-rate the speaker to 300W max in this configuration. Yor cab volume can work with your speakers though you'd need to shorten the ports to get the best out of the cab, not lengthen them as you have this size of cab will give you the deepest bass. BFM's dimensions would be better IMO, you can use the full 450W without distortion and you'll have a cab that is much lighter and more portable. It's as near as dammit to Eminences medium cab. You'll lose a bit of deepest bass but it will still give a very satisfying bass sound without sounding overblown in a band situation.

Yeah I think planning your next System is a great idea. It is much better to know where you are going as it informs your purchases rather than rushing into cheap fixes that only last a few weeks before needing the next bodge. I've spent a lot of money early on making do when a more measured approach would have saved a bit of money in the long run. I learned loads by making mistakes though That's why I applaud your current solution. It lets you get on with playing music whilst you plan something better. I used to have a Stagepas 300 and that and the 500 aren't really good for a band, they just struggle for volume. the 400/600 were much better. They are good for monitors though as the sound is pretty good with no nasties to cause feedback issues. You don't need them to go so loud as monitors. If you do go for a crossover I wouldn't worry too much about the brand, Behringer are the most widely available https://www.thomann.co.uk/behringer_cx2310_v2.htm but there are lots of other OEM products that are essentially similar. Used ones are curently £35-50 on Marketplace but at £77 a new one might be worthwhile depending upon how tight funds are. You'll get £35-50 if you upgrade so it'll cost you £30ish for indefinite 'hire'. If you want small then there is this. It's programmable and 24db/octave filters are available on all four channels. You've also got limiting so you could program in some protection for your tops. Harder to sell on when you've finished with it though as it is a more techie solution https://www.thomann.co.uk/the_t.racks_dsp_4x4_mini.htm

I'm not criticising anybody Al I've done many a bodge over the years when money was tight and I needed a practical solution. I'd rather be constructive and help people squeeze a little more out of what they have or save them money when it is tight by counselling against a purchase that won't help. Trying out what you have makes sense. If it works then it isn't wrong but maybe just a bit less than ideal. In this case the lackof a crossover and the positionng of the speakers worries me a little. The idea of a bass cab as a sub not at all. Without a crossover all the bass from the amp is going to the tops and the main reason for a sun is to divert the bass away from the tops so they can be worked harder and cleaner for the mids and highs. You can pick up used crossovers for maybe £50 so adding one at some stage could be a consideration. Having your bass amp behind the mic line with vocals going through it means the vocal mic will pick up amplified vocals. On some stages that will lead to more chance of feedback and it does muddy the vocals anyway. It may be that the bass energy for the audience is worth having and trading it for the downsides still gives a better sound after everything is taken into account. Getting a crossover and putting the bass cab in front of the mic line would be better and a crossover is going to be cheaper than a new sub so maybe that is the next purchase.

Welcome to BassChat This is the link to Eminence's own designs for your Kappalite, basically they offer three different designs small medium and large. Congratulations your Kappalite's are great drivers for bass. As used in the original Barefaced Compact cabs. https://cdn.shopify.com/s/files/1/0270/8665/1462/files/Kappalite_3015_cab.pdf I'm a little surprised by your cab farting out. I'm not sure if you are hearing wind noise from the ports or over excursion of the speaker. I've done no calculations as yet but your cab is not far off the large cab in Eminence's own design, so this is unexpected. I also don't know what amp you are using or what your tone settings are but at full power the excusion shouldn't be excessive down to 40Hz which is basically bottom E, You'll notice in the Eminence spec they specify a 35Hz filter to protect the speaker. It might be the solution to use an HPF like the Thumpinator to remove the harmful but almost inaudible subsonics from reaching your cab. That will cure wind noise and over excursion. I also note that Eminence themselves only use 300W through the large cab not 450W. Incidentally in their 5cu ft cab they use two 3.5" ports 4"dia so you may be tuning too low.

You probably wouldnt want Mrs S supervising your life Not a woman to be messed with.

I probably should have said before, I'll bring a PA.

I think you will be fine. Our ears aren't great at hearing sub 120Hz so the quality of the subs is going to be less than crucial. I've done gigs at excruciating sound levels with some ancient JBL 125W subs and they did add something and spared the tops a little too, so job done. If you bought these online then you've got a return period to reject it and a chance to try it out at home so the risks are almost zero. Is Sylvie able to record some of the gig? it would be great to know how you get on with the sub, on spec it is the bargain of the moment. It might be a great cab to mod too. For well under £100 you could put in a reasonable neo driver and maybe save a kilo or two whilst improving the performance. Anyway I'd love to know how you get on with it. Hope it works out

Have you already bought? If so it's too late but looking at this makes me ask the question is a cheap 10" speaker actually going to be 'better' than the two good quality 8's you have in the QSC's? My thinking is that this cab is made of MDF which is excellent for cabs but just about the heaviest material you could use so that it means the speaker has a reasonably lightweight magnet. To get decent efficiency and low frequency extension you kind of need a big magnet. I haven't got time at the moment but could look at the QSC's to see if they might not do the job alone without the subs. I've used them at open mics for bass and been surprised at how capable they are. My thinking is that these tiny pubs (and I have my own in mind, The Green Dragon) often are pretty awful spaces and deep bass is unwanted. Cramped spaces means you are up against walls and low ceilings which reinforce the bass as well as turning it to mush. Basically I can put in some specs for a decent 8 and a cheap 10 into winISD and speculate upon which might do best with bass. If you've already bought then just trying them out would be better of course.

Thanks, looks like they are standard size then. My tent pole bag is 120cm which just leaves space for a few leads as well as the lights. Whilst I was checking the dimensions of my existing lights I tool a pic of my adapted bass case with the 'spare' lights in. You can see where I removed some of the foam when I cut it out to accommodate the lights. As a case it offers good protection and will take 5 strip lights at a time

@Al Krow what is the length of your wall washer bars, the ones you got from AliExpress?

I don't think/can't imagine that would work on modern DMX lighting. The control of the LED's is by programming them not by varying the voltage. The issue with dimming them is the internal chip that controls the built in sequences and fx. You can only access what the manufacturers programmed in and usually for the sequences, sound to light and strobe that means full power. You can fade the RGB and other colours individually in 'colour' mode but if you want sound to light then you'd have to override the internal DMX with the sort of controller I accidentally purchased above. DMX is good fun but time consuming and has a learning curve similar to using a digital sound mixer so I've never bothered using it with a band lighting set up. The pre programmed sequencies tend to do the job though generally I'd prefer some slower fade sequences for a band. Rapid flashing works for a disco but less well for a band. I've seen some of the function bands use software that passes DMX control of the lights over to a laptop or tablet. Ultimately this means you can programme you lightshow for each song and even sync it if you play to a click track. It looks so cool but what a lot of work for a pub gig. I know one band where a single mouse click to select a song will start the click track, insert backing tracks bring up lyrics and chord charts, scroll them, adjust the mixer and even set all the fx on your pedal board, all for each song. At the end of the song all the reverb is removed from the mixer so you don't get it for the announcements. Crazy but good.

It's a shame Newcastle is so far away, it's a set up I'd love to get a really good look at.

The problem is one of phase. When two speakers are separated then the sound from one will reach you later than the sound from the other. If they are a substantial fraction of a wavelength apart then the sound may be in phase and reinforce each other or out of phase and cancel each other. This leads to power alleys where the bass is louder and other places where it is quieter. It's frequency/wavelength dependant so the distortion caused will vary as you move around. You can hear this quite clearly in outdoor events where there are subs either side of the stage. Indoors the walls reflect the sound and the multiple pathways the sound uses to reach your ears smears this effect. In the end practicality kicks in. Ideally you want your subs on the ground in front of a raised stage but this is rarely possible, and placing the subs together can be tricky. I've played a lot of venues where punters killing themselves by knocking the tops off stands are more of an issue than sound quality. It is a bit of an issue though as you point out when designers of systems seem not to know about sub placement . To be fair to them most of their customers would probably prefer the look of subs either side of the stage as that's what they would do in practice so their ads show what the customer wants. When I looked up BA systems the website has been taken down and sombody called Kevin has retired due to ill health with just a FB page remaining so I'd contact them before going this direction to check if they are still trading.